Managing Abundance

So, you want more. Good for you. You want more time, more money, more stuff, more satisfaction, more life. Great! You strive for abundance which, by the way, happens to be our natural state as human beings. But are you prepared for that? Are you really ready to enjoy what you wish?

I’m not talking from a philosophical, law-of-attraction-ish standpoint. I’m talking from a very practical, day to day approach for managing your future abundance. If you consciously chose abundance and if you achieve it honestly, then you have to be able to actually manage it.

During my life I had several abundance thresholds. When I left home and came in my country’s main town to study, I had virtually nothing. I worked during my studies and I successfully managed to financially sustain myself during that time, and I did it more than decent. During next years I passed over several abundance milestones: from going out of the student’s hostel to rent my own apartment, later to buy my own apartment, and even later to move into my own house. Which, by the way, I discovered I had to clean a lot.

Each time I reached those milestones I faced several challenges. Each time I had to cope with a bigger flow of stuff coming into my life. But it wasn’t only stuff, it was more than that. I realized that abundance can walk into your life by taking one of the following three shapes. There is another one, the 4th shape, but I reserved a special chapter to it, at the end of this post.

1. You can have more stuff: 2 cars instead of one, a house instead of an apartment, more gadgets, more clothes, more things – you know the drill…2. You can have more action: going to the gym, socializing in a different way, making appearance to new events, doing something completely new – everything that your new status requires from you to do in order to keep it up and running3. You can be involved in new relationships: new friends, new social positions for you, a pool guy, a maid, a chauffeur, or just new persons that needs your constant attention

Don’t laugh. Or if you laugh just keep reading because this is about you and the abundance you are eager to achieve. It will include all this stuff. It will change your life. It will challenge you at a very deep level. It’s ok to laugh, as long as you’ll be prepared.

Failing to realistically manage your abundance can have unpleasant consequences. You can find yourself overwhelmed and lose track of your possessions, or you can fail in managing your new level of relationships and let your wealth slip through your fingers. Or you can be fooled into a “don’t deserve this because I don’t don’t know how to handle it” pattern, which is even worse than the first situation.

So here comes the practical advice:

Work Out Your Memory

If it’s going to be more, it’s going to be much more difficult to remember, isn’t it? Being it money, possessions or relationships. Work out your memory and try to remember everything new. It’s so easy to get into a relaxed pattern of “there is more than enough” (which is of course true, at a certain level) and don’t assess you new realm often. Believe it or not, you can end up buying the same thing twice. Or more.

And don’t judge your current situation from a quantitative standpoint. If you’re going to have a new apartment with one extra room, give your full attention to that new room. Squeeze that room into your conscious memory with all there is in it. Make it part of your daily routine, integrate it into your life. There is no management difference form having an extra room in a new apartment and having 4-5 different real estate properties. It may happen to you sooner thank you think.

Respect The People In Charge Of Your Stuff

When your new financial level changes you will have more people around you to help you with your new status. They can be your accountant, your maid, your pool guy, your property manager, whatever. They aren’t machines or accessories of your new financial status. They are real people and they expect to be treated like this. Take care to give them clear directions and have honest expectations from them.

Maybe you had only yourself to manage your stuff so far, but maybe this mindset was the only obstacle from you to enjoy abundance. If you can have only as much as you can handle, that wouldn’t be too much, isn’t it? If your financial status really changes, there will be need for more people involved in this. Treat them as you would treat yourself.

Meet New People From The Same Financial League

At the beginning you’ll be a little shy. If you’re just the new kid on the block, you’ll feel uncomfortable reaching out to people in the same financial league. There is some inner cultural block that tells you to practice a dumb modesty or common sense. It’s ok to be modest, but modesty doesn’t mean you’re not allowed to make new contacts in your new relationship circle.

It’s very important to meet new people with the same financial level. You will learn a lot from them and they can learn a lot from you. Reaching a new financial level is a changing experience, and forbidding your relationship circle to follow into this new level will only make things difficult.

Organize Your Life

If you reached so high, it’s because you really, really strived for. You had a certain discipline and routine that helped you achieve your goals. Well, keep that going, even if your goals are already history. Keep your life organized and lean. No need to become a productivity freak, but it’s crucial to keep an eye on your time, on your daily activities and your stuff. Don’t get lazy.

Assess what you do with your time and where most of your daily routine is taking place. Don’t throw anything away unless it’s completely useless (no emotional link left). Instead, assess the lifetime of an object and decide what to do with it: downgrade it, give it away for charity, store it. Know what is to be known about your universe. It’s your brand new, bigger, larger and richer universe, after all.

It All Starts In Your Heart

OK, I cheated a little, I confess. I told you about a 4th shape of the abundance, but to be honest, that 4th shape is the 1st and the biggest one. In fact, all other shapes are just consequences, later effects of this first abundance manifestation. And that shape is your heart. It’s what you have there and what you allow to come and stay there.

It’s the size of your friendship circle and the count of your love feelings. It’s the size of your inner beauty real estate and the music of your most precious passions. It’s the sublime vibration of all your past, present and future creations and the generosity of your gratitude attitude. That’s the real source of all the abundance you can imagine. It’s your soul and his ability to connect with so many new people, to make new friends and to share and receive love. It all starts there.

The part where I didn’t cheat is the part about management. Just because it’s in your heart, doesn’t mean it can’t be managed. In fact, you should manage it with all your strength, because this is the source of every other physical form of abundance. The good news is that “managing” your heart is so much easier than you think.

Take care of your friends and loved ones. Make room for new friends and enlarge those love windows. Forgive more and play often. Stretch your feeling muscles if you think you can’t keep up with all the love you need. Be childish and ready for anything. Make room in your life for beauty, passion and love.

The rest will follow.

Running For My Life - from zero to ultramarathoner

The spooky thing about depression is that it sneaks in. There aren’t really trumpets and loud voices announcing: “Hail, hail, this is depression entering the room, all rise!” Nope. It’s slow, silent, creepy. It doesn’t even look like depression. It starts with small isolation thoughts like: “Maybe I shouldn’t get out today, I just don’t feel like going out”. And then it does the same next day. And then the day after that and so on. And then it starts to whisper louder and louder in your ears: “Why would you go outside, you loser? Didn’t have enough yet? Want more people to make fun of how much of a big, fat loser you are?”

And then you start to breath in guilt and shame, instead of air. Every breathe you take is putting more dark thoughts into your body.

Until you get stuck. You can’t move anymore. At all.If you want to know how I got out of this space, eventually, check out my latest book on Amazon and Kindle.

I feel wanting more means more work and one has to be realistic when it come to material possessions. The actual necessity for it or is it a waste of hard earned money?
I’m not a material girl. What cash I make looks prettier to me while it is making more money. That doesn’t mean I don’t like to travel or have nice things. I just spend wisely. I do tend to help others more because I can.
I can only drive one car at a time. The ” house” we are working on.
Now the gym – I have utilized for years. It is a great place to meet people. People are our greatest assets, I believe.
I already keep a log. Very important for new ideas and new acquaintances.Often I find I can forget details about a property I own and have managed for me until I’m notified of a problem.
The heart- well yes you can manage the heart. You have to still take care that you spend time for family and friends. They are really part of your PR.
Great article Dragonu!
Cheers

Got the wonderful article from you, read it carefully and with deep consideration. I found the words that have been important for me for a long time arranged neatly and the message complete – at least for now. The concept of the “house” is so appealing to me. Surprising how true is the saying: “The teacher is at hand when the pupil is ready.” What is more, the preceding comment is made by someone I admire. Thank you very much, Dragonu

This is a great article Dragos and on a topic very dear to me. I love seeing abundance as it is now, not what it is I hope to have or want to have. That whole problem you outline of managing more stuff is unfortunately largely unrecognized by people and as they fill their lives with meaningless stuff, they don’t even realize what they are actually missing.

I also just read your article on choosing to ignore things, I think that one is actually a perfect continuation of this article, and sound advice for one who hopes to ignore some of the things that do get in the way of what’s really important to them in life.